International Theatre Vienna

Last updated March 07, 2023

The International Theater (IT) was an English language theatre in Vienna, located in a former market at Porzellangasse 8, intended as an educational resource for teachers of English and literature in Austria, promoting cultural understanding between the United States and Austria, and providing a creative outlet for local artists.^[1]^[2] The theatre closed permanently on June 30, 2012.

The theatre

The theatre boasted a proscenium-style raised stage with an auditorium at ground level. The main theatre had a capacity of 68 seats, and the theatre had its own workshops to build sets and scenery items as well as furniture, props and costume storage facilities. The theatre was mainly used to stage plays, though musicals had been produced as well.

History

The International Theatre was one of the two professional English-language theatres in Vienna (the other being Vienna's English Theatre). It was founded in 1974 by American opera-singers William and Marilyn Wallace and started as a touring company. The first performance (Blithe Spirit, by Noël Coward) premiered in Graz in November 1974. For the next few years the Wallaces toured shows like Samuel Beckett's Happy Days around the provinces. The IT found its first permanent home in Vienna's 9th district, at the disused Rossauer Cinema on Glasergasse. After several years there, it moved to its present home on January 14, 1980. After the death of her husband William in 2001, Marilyn Wallace assumed the role of executive producer.

Operation

The IT was run as a traditional, around-the year playhouse, with a season lasting from mid-September until beginning of July the next year. Between 4 and 6 productions were presented each season, all produced in-house. The programme relied on long-runs, with occasional repertoire phases, runs lasting between 7 and 18 weeks. Some productions have run for a considerably longer period. All aspects of theatrical productions, including casting, directing, scenery, costume and property production, were covered by in-house staff. Don Fenner held the post of artistic director for over twenty years and was also the theatre's technical director. Upon his retirement in 2005, these duties were split between the current artistic director, Jack Babb, and a technical director. For over twenty years, the Fundus, a thrust-like studio space in the cellar of the Servitenkirche was used as a second theatre. In recent years, no productions have been mounted there, seemingly due to "building restrictions". During a short period in the mid-1990s, a repertory system operated at IT, with both the Funds and the Main Stage presenting productions simultaneously. In late 2009, the diocese did not renew the lease contract for the Fundus and told the management that it would have to vacate the space. The Fundus, which had been closed for several months, was abandoned in February 2010.

Controversy

The IT received an annual subvention from the City of Vienna, the amount decreasing steadily with each new year. In 2005, the council launched a theatre reform and appointed an evaluation jury to cut back on the number of theatres it supported. The IT, along with numerous other small companies, did not receive a recommendation and the jury suggested termination of the financial support, which would have resulted in the theatre's closure for good. The crisis was averted by the intervention of ex-mayor Helmut Zilk on the theatre's behalf. The subvention was then cut back severely.

In 2005, the Kontrollamt, the council's auditing body, investigated the theatre's financial records, unearthing major inconsistencies and hinting at fraudulent methods and tax evasion. The theatre was fined and had to re-pay a third of the subvention of the following three years to the council. The tabloid press launched a campaign against the theatre on the basis of the Kontrollamt's reports. Wallace never issued an official response to the allegations and the matter soon vanished from the news items.

Closure

In May 2012, the City of Vienna announced that it would suspend all further payments to the theatre.^[3] The theatre's closure followed on June 30, 2012^[4] after 37 years of operation and a final performance of Alan Ayckbourn's comedy "Relatively Speaking". Wallace retired on July 1. The premises of the theatre stood empty for years until in late 2016, a new German-speaking company moved in, carried out cosmetic renovation work and renamed the place "Bronski & Grünberg".

Marilyn Wallace (née Close) died on February 16, 2022, aged 92.^[5]

Related Research Articles

A theatre director or stage director is a professional in the theatre field who oversees and orchestrates the mounting of a theatre production such as a play, opera, dance, drama, musical theatre performance, etc. by unifying various endeavors and aspects of production. The director's function is to ensure the quality and completeness of theatre production and to lead the members of the creative team into realizing their artistic vision for it. The director thereby collaborates with a team of creative individuals and other staff to coordinate research and work on all the aspects of the production which includes the Technical and the Performance aspects. The technical aspects include: stagecraft, costume design, theatrical properties (props), lighting design, set design, and sound design for the production. The performance aspects include: acting, dance, orchestra, chants, and stage combat.

Jean-Georges Noverre was a French dancer and balletmaster, and is generally considered the creator of ballet d'action, a precursor of the narrative ballets of the 19th century. His birthday is now observed as International Dance Day.

Stagecraft is a technical aspect of theatrical, film, and video production. It includes constructing and rigging scenery; hanging and focusing of lighting; design and procurement of costumes; make-up; stage management; audio engineering; and procurement of props. Stagecraft is distinct from the wider umbrella term of scenography. Considered a technical rather than an artistic field, it is primarily the practical implementation of a scenic designer's artistic vision.

The Vienna State Opera is an opera house and opera company based in Vienna, Austria. The 1,709-seat Renaissance Revival venue was the first major building on the Vienna Ring Road. It was built from 1861 to 1869 following plans by August Sicard von Sicardsburg and Eduard van der Nüll, and designs by Josef Hlávka. The opera house was inaugurated as the "Vienna Court Opera" in the presence of Emperor Franz Joseph I and Empress Elisabeth of Austria. It became known by its current name after the establishment of the First Austrian Republic in 1921. The Vienna State Opera is the successor of the old Vienna Court Opera. The new site was chosen and the construction paid by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1861.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) is a regional repertory theatre in Ashland, Oregon, United States, founded in 1935 by Angus L. Bowmer. The Festival now offers matinee and evening performances of a wide range of classic and contemporary plays not limited to Shakespeare. During the Festival, between five and eleven plays are offered in daily rotation six days a week in its three theatres. It welcomed its millionth visitor in 1971, its 10-millionth in 2001, and its 20-millionth visitor in 2015. At any given time between five and eleven plays are offered in daily rotation six days a week in its three theatres.

Santa Fe Opera (SFO) is an American opera company, located 7 miles (11 km) north of Santa Fe, New Mexico. After creating the Opera Association of New Mexico in 1956, its founding director, John Crosby, oversaw the building of the first opera house on a newly acquired former guest ranch of 199 acres (0.81 km²).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barry Kay</span>

Barry Kay was an Australian stage and costume designer of international renown. After having studied painting at the Académie Julian in Paris and theatre design in Melbourne, he settled in London in 1956. In the course of his career, lasting almost four decades, he designed for the ballet, opera and theatre alike, working with established directors and choreographers at major theatres and opera houses and their companies worldwide.

The Theater an der Wien is a historic theatre in Vienna located on the Left Wienzeile in the Mariahilf district. Completed in 1801, the theatre has hosted the premieres of many celebrated works of theatre, opera, and symphonic music. Since 2006, it has served primarily as an opera house, hosting its own company.

The National Youth Theatre of Great Britain (NYT) is a youth theatre and registered charity in London. Its aim is to develop and nurture young people through creative arts and theatrical productions. Founded in 1956 as the world's first youth theatre, the NYT has built a reputation for producing actors such as Daniel Craig, Daniel Day-Lewis, Timothy Dalton, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Idris Elba, Colin Firth, Derek Jacobi, Ben Kingsley, Ian McShane, Helen Mirren, Lysette Anthony, Rosamund Pike, Regé-Jean Page and Kate Winslet, among numerous others.

The Vienna Volksoper is an opera house in Vienna, Austria. It produces three hundred performances of twenty-five German language productions of opera, operetta, musicals, and ballet, during an annual season which runs from September through June.

The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company is a professional British light opera company that, from the 1870s until 1982, staged Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas nearly year-round in the UK and sometimes toured in Europe, North America and elsewhere. The company was revived for short seasons and tours from 1988 to 2003, and since 2013 it has co-produced four of the operas with Scottish Opera.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karin Schäfer</span>

Karin Schäfer is a performance artist and the head of the Karin Schäfer Figuren Theater - Visual Theatre Productions company. After studying puppetry arts with Harry V. Tozer at Barcelona's Instituto del Teatro and working in Spain for several years, she returned to Austria in 1993.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to stagecraft:

Renato Zanella is an Italian-born ballet dancer, choreographer and director. He studied classical ballet for several years before becoming a choreographer for various professional companies. Due to his success, he has won many awards and honorary titles within the ballet community.

Dorothea Nicolai is a German costume designer, stage designer, author and curator. From 2000 to 2007 and from 2012 to 2015 she worked as director for costumes, make-up and wigs of the Salzburg Festival. 2017/18 she was responsible for the costumes at the Bayreuth Festival.

Schauspielhaus Wien is a theatre in Vienna, Austria, located at 19 Porzellangasse in the 9th District of Vienna (Alsergrund).

Shakespeare in Styria was an annual Shakespeare festival in the Upper Styrian town of Murau in Austria. The festival was founded in 2002 by British-born theatre manager Nicholas Allen and Austrian writer Rudolph J. Wojta.

Karl M. Sibelius is an Austrian cultural manager, actor, singer and theatre director. From 2012 to 2015, he was artistic director at the Theater an der Rott in Eggenfelden, Lower Bavaria. From August 2015 to November 2016, he was general director with overall artistic, commercial and personnel responsibility at the Theater Trier.

The Seefestspiele Mörbisch, originally: Seespiele Mörbisch, is an annual operetta festival in Mörbisch am See (Austria). With around 150,000 visitors, the Mörbisch Lake Festival is the world's largest festival of the operetta genre. In addition to operettas, classical musicals are also performed on an irregular basis. Above all, the natural scenery of Neusiedler See is always incorporated into the stage set. The area is very flat, so transmission technology specially developed for the Lake Festival is used.

The Landestheater Niederösterreich is a Schauspielhaus in the Lower Austrian provincial capital St. Pölten.

References

↑ "Theatre History (archived)". Archived from the original on 5 August 2004. Retrieved 25 July 2021.
↑ "Internationaltheatre Wien - Kulturthemen in Wien". Archived from the original on 2018-07-30. Retrieved 2019-05-09.
↑ "Letzter Vorhang für International Theatre". Wien.orf.at. 29 May 2012. Retrieved 28 March 2019.
↑ "Nach Schließung vom Vienna International Theatre: Neues englisches Theater für Wien". vienna.at. 2012-10-03. Retrieved 2021-07-28.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
↑ "news.ORF.at". news.ORF.at (in German). Retrieved 2022-02-17.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] "Theatre History (archived)". Archived from the original on 5 August 2004. Retrieved 25 July 2021.

[2] "Internationaltheatre Wien - Kulturthemen in Wien". Archived from the original on 2018-07-30. Retrieved 2019-05-09.

[3] "Letzter Vorhang für International Theatre". Wien.orf.at. 29 May 2012. Retrieved 28 March 2019.

[4] "Nach Schließung vom Vienna International Theatre: Neues englisches Theater für Wien". vienna.at. 2012-10-03. Retrieved 2021-07-28.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)

[5] "news.ORF.at". news.ORF.at (in German). Retrieved 2022-02-17.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]